THABAZIMBI
Province: Limpopo (previously Transvaal).
District: Thabazimbi.
Additions: –.
Incorporated: 2000, into Thabazimbi Local Municipality, part of Waterberg District Municipality.
The arms do not appear to be registered, judging from the artwork, but might be. They may be blazoned:
Arms: Per chevron or and sable, upper dexter an Africander bull’s head and shoulders proper, upper sinister miners’ tools crossed gules, in base
an alchemical symbol for iron, or.
Crest: A demi-zebra issuant proper.
Motto: Labora omnia florent.
About the arms:
The bull is of the Africander breed, red-brown in colour with prominent horns and a humped shoulder.
The Africander is the result of
crossing the cattle of the Khoikhoi[1] people – an African cattle breed of Sudanic origin – with cattle of European origin, producing a larger type of beast, retaining the disease-resistant capabilities of African cattle but with heavier musculature.
This cross-breeding in the days of the early Cape settlement resulted in an animal that produced more meat (vital for the provisioning of the Dutch East India Company’s fleets in Table Bay), and altogether a sturdier animal for the onerous task of pulling wagons. It was this breed that provided both motive power and a food source (meat and milk) for the Voortrekkers when they settled the interior regions north of the Vaal River.
The tools are typical miners’ tools, and are to be found symbolising mining in coats of arms from many parts of Europe.
The symbol in the base of the shield is intended to be the alchemical symbol for iron; however it has been turned, and instead of pointing at an oblique angle, like the symbol for the masculine gender (the symbol for iron and the male symbol are traditionally the same) it points vertically.
The zebra is a specimen of Burchell’s zebra (Equus burchelli), known in Afrikaans as the bontkwagga, typical of the wildlife of the area around Thabazimbi, but also a specific reference to the farm Kwaggashoek, on which the town was laid out.
About the town:
J H Williams discovered rich iron-ore deposits in the mountain at Vliegpoort, some 130 km north of Rustenburg, in 1919.
The Union government acquired the ore region in 1927, and mining began on the mountain in 1931 – an event which preceded, and perhaps aided, the establishment of the Iron and Steel
Corporation (Iscor) in 1934.
The mine, and the town that grew up around it, was called Thabazimbi – an amalgam of Sotho and Nguni elements, reflecting the mixed ethnic background of the Bantu-speaking peoples of the region (Tswana [West Sotho] to the south, North Sotho to the north and east, and Ndebele in various parts of the Transvaal Province).
The Sesotho word thaba[2] means “mountain” – the word has the same form in all three Sotho languages – while “-zimbi” is a slightly altered form of the isiNguni word for “iron”; intsimbi in Xhosa, and insimbi in Zulu.[3]
A railway line was built to Thabazimbi in 1934, linking the mine through Northam and Rustenburg to Pretoria.
The mine reportedly has one of the biggest shafts in Africa, and has a hoist capable of conveying 100 people at a time. More than three tons of explosive are used daily to dislodge the ore.
In 1970 ore production came to 1,75 megatons, and between 1934 and ’70, more than 40 Mt of ore was mined and converted into steel at Iscor’s Pretoria works.
Iscor provided accommodation for its employees on the farm Kwaggashoek, and on 4 May 1953 it was proclaimed a township. Its administration, as of the 1970s, was in the hands of a health committee. The town’s area was extended in 1955 and again in ’60.
